May 07, 2007

THIS IS ENGLAND

Conditions of Membership:

  1. You must be over 14 years of age.
  2. You must be of white parentage.
  3. Your spouse or partner must also be white.
  4. No homosexuals, male or female, are allowed as members.
  5. You must not be an illegal drug user.
  6. You must be a British Nationalist first and foremost.
  7. You must not be a member of any other political party in Britain.

Its a shame that most of the commenters on my film about the National Front seem incapable of debate. Maybe unsuprisingly, the most grief I get personally is from people who are against the NF. On the subject I saw This is England last night. I reckon this is one of the best films I have ever seen in my life. The kid who stars in it- all of the actors- are amazing. Everyone who has an interest in the National Front or anyone who grew up in the eighties should watch it. The action and attitude of the characters puts a totally different perspective on the accompanying footage from the Falklands war.

Obviously there were more people against going into Iraq than there were going into the Falklands...but the shame I carry as a British resident, was that it was a war handled in the media as if it were a World Cup summer. Like when England go into the World Cup, there are Union Jacks on the papers, and you can look at headlines from the time and it sounded just like that. Ultimately, I was privy to footage from ITN archives – that wasn’t shown on television – of the people we were fighting, and it was shameful. It was bullying. It was really horrible. How could we have been proud of winning that? It was the equivalent of putting Mike Tyson in the ring with a 7 year-old kid from an infant school. So that was always running in the back of this film – the root level of that horrible racism, that bullying and violence that exists in someone can also be inherent in a nation without us knowing it.

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